do you know already?”
“A simple wall and the force-dome,” she answered immediately.
“Can you reflex cast any spells?”
“Pardon?”
“Have you practiced any to the point of being able to cast them just with barely a thought?”
“Oh. No. I stuck to the basics in school and I always figured my elementals would be better when quick, dirty magic was needed,” she explained.
“Well, the spell I used for Darla was called a ‘point-defense shield,’ and it’s really small. That makes it handy because it doesn’t use much turyn normally, but until you can reflex cast it there’s not much point in having it ready. You’ll have to practice it daily for a long time before that happens.”
“How long?”
“Weeks, months maybe? For the present, the force-dome is more likely to be useful if you’re planning on having a spell prepared in advance.”
Laina sighed. “I’d like to learn it anyway, and the force-missile spell you used.”
“Force-lance,” he told her. Summoning his journals, he used one to supply a couple of sheets of paper and copied the two spells out for her. Then he dismissed the journals and brought out Ethelgren’s Exhortation.
Everyone’s eyes locked onto the rod of iron and silver. Tiny said nothing, but Laina had questions. “First, I’d love to know how you’re making things appear and disappear, but more importantly, is that it?”
Will nodded, holding the rod in his hand. It wasn’t very large, but it had a substantial heft to it. The silver runes glittered as he rolled it between his fingers. “I’ll let you go over those spells while I figure out how to use this.”
“You’re just going to pray over it?”
“Meditate,” he corrected her. “I’m also going to be talking to an old friend, so try not to interrupt. You’re going to hear voices.”
Tiny smirked, and Laina frowned. Will activated the limnthal and addressed the ring as he sat down cross-legged on the floor. He could have used a chair, but he worried in case something happened. It was a shorter fall if he was sitting on the floor rather than a chair. “I’m ready to start trying to attune this relic.”
“And you want me to hold your hand?” asked Arrogan derisively. Laina’s eyes widened when she heard the unfamiliar voice appear, but Tiny shook his head ‘no’ before she could interrupt.
“No. I want you to tell me how to do it.”
“You have to get inside it—or get it inside you. You say it’s a rod? Try jamming it up your ass.”
Laina snorted, and Will gave her a hard look. “I’m serious.”
“Close your eyes and focus your attention on it. Try to imagine that you’re sending turyn into it through your hand. By now you’ve gotten pretty good at your turyn control, so that should be easy. You’ll get a feeling of resistance until you find a match for what the item needs, and it will need a variety of different types of turyn depending on how many spell effects are built into it. Each one will have a different turyn requirement. Make sense?”
“Sort of.”
“It’s like finding the right key for a lock. You keep trying different ones until you get one that matches, except that this lock can probably take a lot of different keys, one for each magical effect it can produce.”
“I see. So, it’s basically like when I attune myself to bypass a ward.”
“Yes, exactly. Except you don’t have the ward to look at and see what you need to match. You have to feel your way blindly until you find all the different types of turyn that the item will accept. Then you have to learn which ones do what.”
Laina couldn’t contain herself any longer. “Isn’t that what a transducer is for? He’s a human, not a transducer. People can’t change their turyn.”
“Who’s that?” asked the ring.
Will glared at his half-sister angrily. “Just someone who didn’t know when to stay home. Don’t worry, though, she may be intrusive, but I trust her.”
“Obviously you’re still an idiot, because from that question I can tell